Mary's Sword

Tuesday, November 18, 2014

What Was Martha Doing? Diakonia in Luke 10:38-42

Paper
for SBL March 29, 2014 at Denver UniversitzMary
A. Hanson

hanson139@comcast.net

Diakonia in Luke 10:38-42:
What Was Martha Doing?

Mary and Martha have drawn strong
reactions in countless sermons and devotions over the years. Since the seventh
century, this passage was the lectionary text for the feast of the Assumption
of Mary. This is but one indication of the importance of Luke 10:38-42 because
Mary, the mother of Jesus, is not a character in the text that was read on one
of her feast days. Homilies from as early
as Jerome, Origen, Cassian, and Augustine are still available to us. From the
medieval period, Meister Eckhart, Teresa of Avila, and Bernard of Clairvaux produced
several sermons on the text. The Reformers entered into the fray; they reinforced
the work ethic, but not at the expense of the spiritual.Today best-selling authors
have popularized the traditional story of Mary and Martha.

Quoting G.B. Caird, “Few stories in
the Gospels have been as consistently mishandled as this one.” The text, as usually
applied, leaves the reader in a quandary. Each reading raises new questions. According
to Jesus himself, Mary is the example to follow,
while Martha appears to be reprimanded. Yet, most women have sympathy for
Martha. Or, is Martha’s activity good, but she should do less of it? Why does
Mary not say anything in her defense? Is a “silent” woman the preferred example
to one that “complains?” Is one sister necessarily an example of “good” and one
an example of “not so good?” Must the sisters be set against each
other?

Why would the “service” that Martha
performed on this occasion of Jesus’ visit be considered unsatisfactory. Jesus
himself offered extravagant practical service in his everyday ministry. He provided
multitudes with abundant food and gathered the leftovers, he changed water to
fine wine, and provided a bounteous harvest of fish. Likewise, in the parable
immediately preceding our passage, the Good Samaritan provides generous
resources to care for the left-for-dead traveler. Why is Martha then criticized
for doing what Jesus himself demonstrated as exemplary care for one’s neighbor?
What was Martha really doing in Luke 10:38-42?

II Difficulties

Interpretation is difficult for
many reasons. The earliest manuscripts contain many textual variants which
indicate scribal uncertainty. The location of the event is unspecified despite
the traditional understanding that Mary and Martha were located in Bethany near
Jerusalem. At this point in Luke’s travel narrative, starting at 9:51, Jesus was
not likely to be near Jerusalem, but still north in Galilee. There is also no
consensus concerning the context of these four verses, with no obvious
connection to the text previous and following. This paper will concern yet another
key issue in Luke 10:38-42, and that is the meaning of the Greek vocabulary. In
particular, I will look carefully the family of diakon-words,
which occur twice in verse 40, both as a verb and as a noun.

Reconsider the possible “service” that Martha is
offering. In verse 40, Luke uses the noun diakoniain the
accusative and the verb diakoneōas an
infinitive. Altogether, Luke uses the verb eight times, which is more than any other NT author, and these are confined mostly
to his Gospel. The semantic range of the meaning of the diakon-wordsin Lukeincludes“wait on, helping to support, do the work, serves, and
preparations.” It can mean many different
kinds of service on the behalf of another, including but not necessarily
restricted to serving a meal.[1]
Of the thirty-four uses in the NT, fourteen times it is translated as
“ministry” in the NIV.[2]

III. Discussion of
Diakoneō

I will first discuss the eight uses
of the verb in Luke’s Gospel. In Luke 4:39 he describes
the activity of Peter’s mother-in-law where upon being healed by Jesus, she illustrated
complete recovery by serving those in attendance. Luke 8:3 describes the
activity of the women who “serve” Jesus, or Jesus and the disciples, while
traveling, with their own resources. The third occurrence of the verb is in the
verse under study: “Do you not care that my sister has left me alone to serve?”

Further, in chapter 12,
Luke records a parable of Jesus using diakoneō when
the master serves his servants who are properly prepared for his return home.
In verse 17:8, Jesus tells of the master who demands to be served by his
servant after a day of work. The last three occurrences are in the discourse of
Jesus in chapter 22:27-28 on “Who is greatest?”Jesus
says of himself, “I am among you as one that serves,” where the verb occurs as
a participle.

The noun diakonia is used only once in all of
Luke, and not in any other of the Gospels, and this one occurance is in (10:40),
which in the age-old understanding, concerns Martha’s service as a hostess. However,
and this is the crux of my thesis, it is not as clear, as many commentators and
popular authors claim, that the Mary and Martha event was a scene in a dining
room and kitchen.

Briefly, I will review Luke’s use
of diakon-words in his second work. In
Acts 1:17, a successor to Judas is chosen to continue the ministry of the
twelve, where diakonia
refers to the work of the disciples. Acts 6:1-6 has a concentration of diakon-words, one use of the verb and
two of the noun. I include this passage
because it is a good illustration of the range of meaning of diakon- words in Luke’s writings. Seven
Hellenists were appointed to devote themselves todiakonia“service at the table”
so the apostles could be free to dodiakonia “service
of the word.” Seven of those chosen are never mentioned again. At least two in
this group, Phillip and Stephen, practiced word-service and became preachers of the early
Christian church.[3]
From Acts 6 alone, there certainly seems to be diverse meaning todiakonia.

Continuing in Acts, Luke also
refers to the famine relief collection for Judea in 11:29 as diakonia.
This same diakonia
was carried out by Barnabas and Saul in 12:25, translated in the NIV “when they
had finished their mission.” In Acts 19:22, Paul uses the participle to describe
the work of Timothy and Erastus. Paul calls his overall ministry diakonia
in 20:24 and 21:19. A similar passage is Rom 12:7. It
would not be out of the question to entertain the possibility that Martha was engaged
in this kind of work and therefore a deacon prototype.[4]

IV
Overview of Interpretations

With this background to the use of diakon-words I will review a sampling of
commentators. As an illustration of traditional thinking, Tannehill maintains
that diakoniain Luke
10:40 refers to hospitality, especially through providing a meal. He does not
broaden to the possibility of an established ministry of preaching and
leadership.[5]
A sample of well-known commentators who claim the conventional understanding of
Mary and Martha in a household dining scene is long and impressive including
Green, Bock, Nolland, Fitmyer, Marshall, LT Johnson, Hendriksen, Craddock,
Tiede.

Elizabeth Schüssler Fiorenza in 1992 noted that
the text does not explicitly refer to a meal and does not place Martha in the
kitchen, and that the more general expression diakonia, leaves
open various possibilities. Also, Jesus’ climactic word does not mention diakonia
but that Martha was troubled and anxious. Schüssler
Fiorenzamaintains that the
word Luke used to describe Martha’s activity had already
become a technical term for ecclesial leadership at the time he was writing
when house-churches provided both preaching of the word and the eucharistic
meal celebration.[6]She claims that Luke was writing
anachcronistically several decades after the event described. According to her
hermeneutic of suspicion, Luke was now restricting women’s activities to
traditional serving, and passive listening by repressing Martha’s serving as a
deacon, and approving Mary’s listening.

Barbara Reid in 1996 acknowledges
that Mary and Martha raise more questions than any other Lukan pericope that
involves women. She maintains that diakonia can mean many different kinds of
service on the behalf of another, including but not necessarily restricted to
serving a meal.[7]
She realizes that most women identify with Martha but warns against the
temptation to rescue Jesus or blunt the absolute approval of Mary and reprimand
of Martha. I agree with her statement, “Our instincts are correct when they
tell us that something is wrong with this picture; but to try to make it into
something that it is not is equally problematic.”[8]

J.N. Collins in 1990 defends the
idea that diakoniadid not describe domestic tasks, but service or ministry on
behalf of Jesus and other disciples. He wrote an entire book on the meaning of diakoniaworking from classical Greek texts to expand the semantic
field from lowly house service, to a “go-between
or emissary,” such as an ambassador or courier.[9]
The Jewish understanding of “service” being mundane household work, has always
been assumed, but Collins raised the possibility that NT writers may have also understood
diakonia in the classic Greek sense of
one who is a messenger, spokesperson or agent.[10]
This included, “mediation,
intercession, agency, and mission in the name of a principle.” The noun was
used for more formal activities and included religious contexts.

More recently in 2007, Anni Hentschel continues the work on diakonia
and notes that the subject can be a man or woman, and indicates ministry in
hospitality or in the broader sense, Phoebe being an example in Romans 16:1.[11]
She concludes that the understanding ofdiakoniain Luke 10:38-42 is determined by context.[12]
She does not find such a strong contrast as Collins, that is, one meaning does
not necessarily preempt the other. Bringing food to the table, or serving in
the community in a more officialcapacity,
do not actually contrast so much.[13]

Warren Carter indicates that Martha
must be held as an example of the positive manner in which Jesus is to be
received as a traveling rabbi as described throughout chapter 10. He notes that
the six uses of dechomai (receive) in
Luke prior to chapter 10 (2:28, 8:13, and four times in 9:48) connect Martha’s
reception of Jesus to those who embrace his escahatological mission and
openness to his message.[14]In 9:52-53 and 10:10 the same word is used to
show a negative reception.For Carter, Martha
is an illustration of the model disciple. “In receiving Jesus, Martha is a
child of peace (10:6) who has encountered God’s reign (Luke 10:9).”[15]
Therefore, it is unlikely that Martha is intended by Luke as a negative
example. He makes a convincing argument that Martha is distracted by her
responsibilities of leadership and house ministry.[16]

In summary so far, Luke is probably
intending both sisters as examples of exemplary discipleship. “Listening” akouō is always a favorable activity in
Luke. Mary’s akouō“listening”is the
opposite of the example of the person in 10:16 who rejects atheteō. “To hear” is the antithesis of “to reject.” Likewise
Martha “receives” Jesus in contrast to the Samaritans who did not receive him.
To “hear” and to “act” describes the ideal response to the gospel in 8:21. Both
women are the positive examples as opposed to the earlier negative examples.

V. Conclusion

Turid Karlsen Seim adds
insights to the conclusions of the previous commentators. Seim notes that the first
three uses of the verb in Luke have a woman or women as the subject. Furthermore,
Seim adds that diakoneōin two of
these three verses seem to indicate women supporting Jesus by use of their own
resources. I would say that could also be true in the case of Peter’s
mother-in-law, who may have been the owner of her house, serving Jesus from her
own wealth. She was not a common servant in her own house. The use of a daikon-word seems to indicate a higher
level of service to the kingdom, as a householder taking care of her guests. akouō describes service by someone who is serving
voluntarily from their own resources. Another verb, hetoimazō is commonly used by Luke to describe common preparations,
but which he did not use in this text.

Seim
makes a unique observation: the early use of diakon-words by Jesus describes the behavior of women, but as his
mission progresses, men are seen practicing diakonia,
and finally Jesus himself. In other words, as women were habitually accustomed
to serving, so should all people willingly serve self-sacrificially.[17]
In Luke’s history of Jesus’ ministry, diakonia
is first found in the description of women’s activities, then used in parables
as teaching material, and finally the ideal behavior for leaders. All people
are to undertake leadership as “service.”

My goal in this presentation is to
move this well-worn passage away from the traditional understanding that Luke
is describing Martha as being over-worked in a dining situation. I intended to
remove the sisters from opposition to each other, especially as an example of a
contemplative life as preferable to the active life. I propose, that the source
of Martha’s distress is not too much kitchen work, but distress over too much
“service” of another unspecified sort and she is not getting the help from Mary
that she thinks she needs.

Putting aside whatever reason there
may be for Mary’s lack of availability to help Martha, there is enough evidence
that Martha’s activity does not have to be restricted to a narrow definition of
service such as preparing food. Martha was probably active in her first-
century community in ministry to new believers. I am not ruling out the
possibility that she served Jesus food on that day, and he may have stayed at
her house, but that was not the source of her being pulled apart by much worry.
She may very well have been a leader of an assembly place and teacher of early followers
of Jesus, instead of, or in addition to, providing as hostess the comforts of a
temporary home for Jesus.

There are very good grounds for
imagining that Martha’s activity is closer in line with the work of what we
would now call that of a deacon. If Martha’s work is described as a wide range
of diverse activities, the story attains more depth and resonates with men and
well as women.Further, to expand into
my further research, I do not think that there is even evidence that Mary is in
the house that day of Jesus’ visit. Martha does not speak to Mary herself,
because Mary is not there. She is gone! Therefore, Martha’s stress is due to
worry about her sister being away—perhaps on the road with Jesus in ministry—and
therefore unable to give Martha a hand with her “much service.” But, that is
another paper. Now, I would like to see an end to the popular impression of
Luke 10:38-42 as a scene of Martha being over-worked in serving many disciples
and prevailing upon Jesus to get Mary to help her with kitchen work.